Wealth distribution

[HoreTore]

Simply put, the difference in wealth is so huge that it dwarfs the difference in wealth in middle ages between aristocracy and peasants.

No need to go that far back in time. The wage difference between CEO wage and employee wage has increased massively just from the 80's. Pointing out that there's no proper reason why a CEO of today should make so many times more than a CEO of the 80's(there's no reason to believe that we are working harder or smarter now than in the 80's) of course leads certain people to whine about communism and Stalin and mass-murder and all that rubbish.

One of the fundamental flaws of capitalism is the lack of a corrective mechanism to wealth accumulation. Having capital makes it easier to gain more capital, having more capital makes it even easier to gain much more capital and so on. The threat of going back to square one is minimal.

The end result is that the the level of wealth owned is increasingly becoming detached from the work put in. I will have roughly the same amount of wealth no matter what I do in life, and I will never sink to the level of wealth of Joe Indianslum. Joe Indianslum, on the other hand, can work as hard as he wants, but he will never be able to attain the level of wealth I have even if I choose to sit on my couch watching TV all my life.

The idea that we live in a meritocracy is false, we are living in a hereditary system. Our birth determines our lives just as much as the birth of a crown prince affects his chance of becoming king.

[Andres]

No need to go that far back in time. The wage difference between CEO wage and employee wage has increased massively just from the 80's. Pointing out that there's no proper reason why a CEO of today should make so many times more than a CEO of the 80's(there's no reason to believe that we are working harder or smarter now than in the 80's) of course leads certain people to whine about communism and Stalin and mass-murder and all that rubbish.

One of the fundamental flaws of capitalism is the lack of a corrective mechanism to wealth accumulation. Having capital makes it easier to gain more capital, having more capital makes it even easier to gain much more capital and so on. The threat of going back to square one is minimal.

The end result is that the the level of wealth owned is increasingly becoming detached from the work put in. I will have roughly the same amount of wealth no matter what I do in life, and I will never sink to the level of wealth of Joe Indianslum. Joe Indianslum, on the other hand, can work as hard as he wants, but he will never be able to attain the level of wealth I have even if I choose to sit on my couch watching TV all my life.

The idea that we live in a meritocracy is false, we are living in a hereditary system. Our birth determines our lives just as much as the birth of a crown prince affects his chance of becoming king.

Giving us the idea that we live in a meritocracy must be one of the biggest scams in the Western world from the last few decades.

Sure, you'll have exceptions and everybody always refers to exceptions when you say we do not live in a meritocracy, forgetting that it are, well, exceptions and not the rule.

I don't think accumulating wealth in itself is bad. After all, we are humans and most of us need some selfish incentive to try our best to make ourselves useful for society. You are absolutely right that it's the limitless and uncontrolled accumulation of wealth that is problematic.

[HoreTore]

I don't think accumulating wealth in itself is bad. After all, we are humans and most of us need some selfish incentive to try our best to make ourselves useful for society. You are absolutely right that it's the limitless and uncontrolled accumulation of wealth that is problematic.

I consider accumulation of wealth to be a glorious thing. The problem isn't a person accumulating wealth, but rather the accumulation of wealth by wealth itself reaching the point where nearly all the accumulation occuring is due to wealth and not the efforts of a person.

The basic premise of the carrot and stick-feature of capitalism is that a persons effort determines that persons piece of the pie. The problem is that the persons effort is largely irrelevant, and all that matters is the persons existing piece of the pie.